Why We Need to Care About Empathy

There is a really great RSA animated video explaining Jeremy Rifkin’s idea of the Empathic Civilization. He argues that we are neurologically wired for human relatedness and empathy through mirror neurons: we are soft-wired for sociability, attachment, affection and companionship – we have a deep drive for belonging.

Rifkin believes that we need to cultivate empathy to survive and thrive as a species. We can do this by extending our empathy to the entire human race. Over our history as a species, empathy has grown in scope from: blood ties –> religious ties –> national identity. We just need to extend one step further to embrace the whole world.

Enjoy the video.

People, Profit, Purpose

I like how Rifkins’s ideas are aligned with the triple bottom line of people, planet, profit. When we focus on building high-performance organizations by cultivating empathy skills (profit motive), we also better ourselves to help the people around us and the planet as a whole.

Michael is the number one trainer for the Certified Agile Leadership (CAL1) Program through the Scrum Alliance after teaching over half the graduates worldwide.

His classes are controversial and unique but that’s what allows his Agile students to flourish by showing them the missing pieces and common organizational challenges you can go back and implement immediately.